Trinamool Congress’s two top leaders, Mamata Banerjee and Abhishek Banerjee, will officially start campaigning for the Lok Sabha elections from the historic Brigade Parade Ground of Kolkata on March 10.
What’s different at the meeting this time is a special 100-metre ramp has been made longitudinally from the stage, and the arm on one side has been extended from the main extension, approaching 80 metres, so the speakers can reach out to the audience sitting behind.
Sources say the idea of building such a stage came from TMC national general secretary Abhishek Banerjee.
Party sources say West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee loves to stay in the middle of the people and this stage would allow her to reach out to the last person in the audience. Those gathered at the Jono Gorjon (roar of the people) meeting too would get an opportunity to see their leader from close proximity.
Abhishek Banerjee came to check out the preparations on Thursday evening and gave certain instructions regarding the stage, sources said.
Mamata Banerjee likes to walk around while she addresses an audience, TMC insiders said. This time, both she and Abhishek would be able to walk around on the ramp, which would feature the Trinamool party symbol Jora Ghas Phul (two flowers with grass), and speak to the people, they added.
Sources said that as Prime Minister Narendra Modi has already completed three election rallies in three Lok Sabha constituencies of West Bengal, the TMC chief wants the Jono Gorjon rally to be massive.
According to TMC sources, this would be the biggest public gathering in the East.
Around 600 key party leaders would feature on the dais that would be divided into three sections.
Apart from West Bengal, TMC leaders from other state units too will be present at the Jono Gorjon rally.
Leaders like Ripun Bora, Sushmita Dev, Mukul Sangma leading the Meghalaya unit, Lalitesh and Rajesh Tripathi, Kirti Azad, Shatrughan Sinha, Saket Gokhale, and Sagarika Ghose will be in attendance.
Mamata Banerjee and Abhishek Banerjee are expected to make important announcements at the meeting, said insiders.
A key theme of the event centres on “Bengal roaring against” what the Trinamool calls the BJP’s “reign of zamindari”.
After the event, Abhishek Banerjee is scheduled to embark on a series of back-to-back public meetings, followed by an extensive mass outreach campaign
Brigade Parade Ground in Kolkata was once synonymous with the Left’s annual rallies that brought the city to a standstill.
In 2019, Mamata started her Lok Sabha campaign here with other top leaders from the then United Progressive Alliance (UPA).
Five years later, Mamata is set to be back, but this time in a TMC event, with no buzz of other allies joining in.
After facing flak over the Sandeshkhali controversy, the TMC is looking to corner the BJP-led Centre over unpaid MGNREGA wages. Mamata Banerjee said on Thursday that this would be the party’s key poll issue. “All people from the party should come to our Jono Gorjon rally and it will be such that Delhi will shiver seeing us,” she said.
TMC has also formed a media war room ahead of the Lok Sabha polls with 40 speakers for quick rebuttals and media soundbites on various issues daily.
Leader of the opposition Suvendu Adhikari though said that the rally would have “no gorjon”.
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